Velocity

Title: Velocity

Author: Dean Koontz

Published in: 2005

Date read: 14th June 2011

Score: 4/5

Genre: Horror, Thriller, Mystery

Plot: (Warning, may contain spoilers):
"Velocity" by Dean Koontz, published in 2005, is a high-concept psychological thriller that plunges an ordinary man into an impossible and terrifying moral dilemma, forcing him to confront the nature of good and evil as a mysterious killer plays a twisted game with his life.

The story centres on Bill Wile, a thirty-year-old bartender and a genuinely kind-hearted, compassionate man living in a quiet resort town in California. His life is content, if unremarkable. All that changes when he finds a note taped to his car windshield. The note contains a simple but chilling ultimatum:

"If you don't take this note to the police and have them investigate, then by the time you read this note in the newspaper, an old woman will have died."

Below this is a second ultimatum:

"If you take this note to the police and have them investigate, then by the time you read this note in the newspaper, a pretty teacher will have died."
The note is signed simply "The Postman."

Bill is plunged into a horrifying moral choice. Either way, an innocent person will die, and he will be complicit. Overwhelmed and fearing that either choice will lead to a death, he does nothing, hoping the note is a cruel hoax. The next day, a newspaper headline confirms his worst fears: an old woman has died in a car crash.

This is just the beginning of the nightmare. More notes follow, each offering Bill a new, equally terrible choice, forcing him to choose between two equally horrific outcomes. The notes are delivered with uncanny precision, and the killer always follows through on the threat, making it clear that he is watching Bill's every move.

Bill finds himself in a desperate, high-stakes game. He must use his wits to try and outsmart the killer, all while staying silent to protect his loved ones and the wider community. He teams up with his fiercely intelligent friend and former lover, Phoebe Tarcher, a professor of criminal behaviour, to try and understand the killer's warped logic and unmask his identity.

The novel is a relentless, fast-paced cat-and-mouse chase, but its real tension comes from the psychological torment of Bill's impossible choices. It explores themes of free will, fate, morality, and the thin line between an ordinary man and a hero. The climax involves Bill uncovering the killer's identity and confronting him in a final, brutal showdown, where he must make one last desperate choice to save himself and the woman he loves.

Comments:
I remember the start so vividly but I am struggling to remember the conclusion, I may have to re-read the final few chapters.

Books that we've read by Dean Koontz (27):
Demon Seed (1973), Icebound (1976), The Voice of the Night (1980), Phantoms (1983), Darkness Comes (1984), Watchers (1987), Dragon Tears (1993), Mr. Murder (1993), Tick Tock (1996), False Memory (1999), The Face (2003), Odd Thomas (Odd Thomas, #1) (2003), The Taking (2004), Forever Odd (Odd Thomas, #2) (2005), Velocity (2005), Life Expectancy (2005), Brother Odd (Odd Thomas, #3) (2006), The Husband (2006), Odd Hours (Odd Thomas, #4) (2008), Breathless (2009), Relentless (2009), The Silent Corner (Jane Hawk, #1) (2017), The Whispering Room (Jane Hawk, #2) (2017), The Crooked Staircase (Jane Hawk, #3) (2018), The Forbidden Door (Jane Hawk, #4) (2018), The Night Window (Jane Hawk #5) (2019), The Other Emily (2021)